SHU's Bike won a lot but always had class, character

Updated 11:54 pm, Friday, February 28, 2014

Sacred Heart men's basketball coach Dave Bike accepts the game ball and acknowledges the crowd after his 500th career victory at the Pitt Center at Sacred Heart University in Fairfield on Sunday, January 2, 2011. less

Sacred Heart men's basketball coach Dave Bike accepts the game ball and acknowledges the crowd after his 500th career victory at the Pitt Center at Sacred Heart University in Fairfield on Sunday, January 2, ... more

The game was over, the championship dream lost to a free throw with no time left on the clock. North Carolina Central was celebrating on the court in Springfield, Mass., and the Sacred Heart Pioneers were walking off toward their locker room, trying their hardest not to turn and watch the party going on behind them.

For Tony Judkins, it was the last time he would wear the Sacred Heart uniform. Playing for Dave Bike made his four-year career all the more special. Over the course of 127 games Judkins played from 1985 to 1989, the Pioneers won 87. They also won two New England Collegiate Conference crowns, went to three NCAA tournaments and captured the NCAA title in his freshman year.

As the senior captain slowly walked down the hall to the postgame news conference with Bike alongside, the coach stopped a few feet away from the door.

"I remember walking toward the press conference with him and we were taking our time," Judkins said the other day, the moment still clear in his mind. "And he was saying, `OK, this is it, this is our last one together,' and we had a moment between us where nothing had to be said. Coach Bike may be this big guy, but he's really a softie at heart. He's got a big heart, he genuinely cares about his players and he wants them to do well off the court as well. That makes him very special to me."

The hundreds of players who played for Bike for 35 seasons feel the same way. If that NCAA Division II championship isn't enough, Bike coached in 1,028 games, winning 529. He took the Pioneers to the NCAA tournament eight times, going to five Elite Eights and winning four NECC tournaments. He was the National Association of Basketball Coaches National Coach of the Year in 1985-86 and a three-time NECC Coach of the Year. And in 1990, Bike was awarded with the Doggie Julian Award for outstanding service by the New England Basketball Coaches Association.

And Saturday at halftime of the Pioneers' season finale against Central Connecticut, Sacred Heart will honor Bike by naming the floor at the Pitt Center the Dave Bike Court.

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Pioneers' day of honorsSacred Heart will host a basketball doubleheader on Saturday -- the women face LIU Brooklyn at 1 p.m., the men play Central Connecticut at 3:30 -- but there's a great deal more on tap. At halftime of the women's game, Stamford native Amanda Pape, the 2006 Northeast Conference Player of the Year who led Sacred Heart to its first NCAA Division I tournament, will be honored for her induction into the NEC Hall of Fame this season.At halftime of the men's game, recently retired coach Dave Bike will also be honored as SHU will name its Pitt Center basketball floor in his honor. Bike won the NCAA Division II national championship and 529 games in his career among his many accolades.Furthermore, Saturday is Senior Day at SHU. The school will pay tribute to four women and two men before their respective games.-- STAFF REPORTS

"When you look around the world, you see where people have floors named after them and it's John Wooden, Pat Summitt, Coach K (Mike Krzyzewski)," said William & Mary women's basketball coach Ed Swanson, who coached with Bike as an assistant from 1989-1992. "They all won a lot of games, but they've also been so impactful in so many people's lives. Dave has taught me so much in how to handle so many different situations ... and not when things were going well, because it's easy to do, but when things aren't going well.

"Dave had a lot of those tough seasons early on and I would watch him very closely during those times and see how he acted, how he treated others and how hard he worked to get out of that. The name on the floor will be to honor his great accomplishments, but it's also about the impact he had on Sacred Heart University and the Bridgeport community and how he did it with a lot of character and class."

Bike grew up on Bradley Street on Bridgeport's East Side. As an 11-year-old, he was on the Bridgeport team that won the 1958 Biddy Basketball National Championships. When he was 14, he played on the city's PONY League baseball team that competed in the World Series. When he was 16, Bike was on the Colt League team that reached the sectional finals.

As a senior at Notre Dame-Bridgeport, Bike averaged 24 points in basketball and hit .402 in baseball as the Lancers reached the state championship in both sports. He spent eight seasons as a catcher in the Detroit Tigers organization, climbing as high as Class AAA Toledo.

He spent four seasons as a basketball assistant at Seattle University before coming back home in 1976 to coach the SHU freshman team. Two years later, he got the varsity job.

And for 35 years, Bike did everything the right way. He was a professional in every sense of the word.

"The thing I'll always remember coach teaching us was `be accountable for your own actions,'" said former player Kevin Stevens, who played for Bike from 1984-87 and is now a project manager for NextGen Networks in Shelton. "When something happens, don't look around to blame someone else, look in the mirror and accept your part in what happened. I reflect on that almost on a daily basis."

Sacred Heart officials estimate that at least 40 former players are returning to honor their former coach, and Judkins, who now works as a program manager for the Connecticut Department of Social Services, will be one of them. And he expected that there wouldn't be a dry eye in the house.